Vision
How do you use existing infrastructure in order to transform public impression of a neighborhood, draw in new visitors, and encourage vibrant public life?
This project focuses on using passageways (empty set-backs between buildings), as innovative sites for social life and activity. I argue that reusing vacant in-between spaces will improve Vliet Street by transforming this once-unsafe and vacant space into an inviting public space for residents and visitors. This strategy of re-using empty in-between space can be used as a tool to rethink what public space and street life means in the context of the 21st Century.
Vliet Street's retail environment will prosper if there are spaces where individuals can safely interact with each other. In her book Death and Life of American Cities, Jane Jacobs explains that eyes on the street can have a great impact on the safety of a neighborhood. The same can be said of passageways and alleyways, locations known to be unsafe. Activating passageways slows pedestrian movement on the sidewalks by providing more spaces to explore while moving down the street. This will also leave the possibility of activating an alley as public space in the future since passageways directly connect the streets to the alleys.
Zach Pate, Undergraduate Senior, Architecture
This project focuses on using passageways (empty set-backs between buildings), as innovative sites for social life and activity. I argue that reusing vacant in-between spaces will improve Vliet Street by transforming this once-unsafe and vacant space into an inviting public space for residents and visitors. This strategy of re-using empty in-between space can be used as a tool to rethink what public space and street life means in the context of the 21st Century.
Vliet Street's retail environment will prosper if there are spaces where individuals can safely interact with each other. In her book Death and Life of American Cities, Jane Jacobs explains that eyes on the street can have a great impact on the safety of a neighborhood. The same can be said of passageways and alleyways, locations known to be unsafe. Activating passageways slows pedestrian movement on the sidewalks by providing more spaces to explore while moving down the street. This will also leave the possibility of activating an alley as public space in the future since passageways directly connect the streets to the alleys.
Zach Pate, Undergraduate Senior, Architecture
My design experiments with ways to modify sidewalks, passageways, alleyways, yards, and in-between spaces in order to create economic and social generators—that is, to add value to a space that is seen as unproductive.
Existing Conditions: An example of a long term plan for this area. Set-back between 3726 and 3722 W. Vliet St. Phase 1 Implementation of crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED). Windows and lights will be installed to enhance safety along these passageways by making them more visible to the public eye. This begins to create an inviting zone that will be built upon in the next phases. Phase 3 Spaces will be created along passageways by pushing exterior walls in at either of the three zones discussed earlier. Pushing the walls in at different spots can create different types of spaces. Newly constructed exterior walls will be modern, while leaving the historic character to walls not touched by the reconstruction. Vliet Street block used as a case study for this project. The physical landscape of Vliet Street includes the road, sidewalks and buildings. However, as a pedestrian walks down the sidewalks, she becomes aware of empty spaces between buildings and setbacks in front of buildings. These spaces choreograph a rhythmic interruption between buildings as a pedestrian walks down the sidewalk. Currently many of such spaces along Vliet Street are vacant transitional zones. The premise of this project is that these fallow spaces could become rich resources for innovative public use. As a result, my design experiments with ways to modify sidewalks, passageways, alleyways, yards, and in-between spaces in order to create economic and social generators—that is, to add value to a space that is seen as unproductive. |
Precedents for this project include thriving urban neighborhoods where similar in-between zones accomodate café seating, benches, elements and uses that encourage people to spend time, rather than simply pass through. Examples in cities across the globe have shown how inactive and dangerous neighborhoods have been transformed by creating active spaces in alleys and passageways.
|